Le Méridien Chiang Rai Review
Paul‘s Hotel Review for the
Details:
Duration of stay: 4 nights / vacation
Check-in / Check-out:
Check-in Process: 
Check-out Process:
Concierge Service:
Staff @ Front Desk:
Bonvoy recognition:
At Check-in:
In General:
Posting of points & nights: follows later.
Room / Bathroom:
Bed, quality of sleep:
Bathroom, Shower:
Room Atmosphere:
WiFi / Internet:
Housekeeping:
Cleanliness:
Food & Beverage:
Breakfast:
Bar:
Restaurant:
Lounge: no lounge
no lounge
Staff:
Paul‘s Mix:
Pool, Spa:
Hotel Location:
Mojito Rating 
:
:
Customer Care:
Staff attitude, interaction and responsiveness:
Social media interaction:
—-
= bad, a lot of work needs to be done
=not good, you will be busy with corrections
= good & normal, nothing special
= high level, but the icing on the cake is missing
= topnotch, leave me here!
= Half a Point/sheep
—-
General Info:
The hotel is located a little outside of Chiang Rai in between the airport (~15min) and downtown (~15min). The hotel is located right by the Mae Nam Kok River.
Everything can be reached easily by Taxi.
The hotel is set back from any road or traffic and the premises are in the green and it is beautifully quiet.
The Hotel has a total of 159 rooms including 1 single suite. The rooms are divided into regular rooms and bigger rooms.
The rooms are spread over 5 buildings over the entire premises and the hotel feels actually much smaller.
The hotel isn't the newest anymore but the rooms as well as the public areas and the restaurants were renovated during covid.
The entire property is in great shape. It is super stylish, modern and has a great colour concept throughout the entire property. Every restaurant or public area have a different main colour
and the decorations represent a lot of the Thai culture.
Check-in:
The check-in was really good.
The agent was super friendly, helpful and chatted with us during the whole process. She was following procedure after procedure after procedure that it felt to robotic and no personal touch
at all.
Check-out:
Check-out was simply said a disaster and one of the worst I have ever had in Asia.
The agent didn't interacted with us, no question if everything was okay, no question about feedback. It was basically:
Agent: checking out?
Me: yes
Agent: your final is xx baht, shall I print it out?
Me: yes
Agent: your credit card
Agent: shall I print the final invoice
Me: yes
Agent: thank you for staying with us
Check out was done in 2 minutes and if the printer wouldn't have slowed down the whole process maybe it would have taken only 30 seconds.
Staff at the front desk was always super friendly and helpful and they always took the time for a chat when you passed the front desk. There was always a smile in their face.
Marriott Bonvoy Ambassador Recognition:
During check-in, the agent acknowledged our status, thanked for the loyalty and we were upgraded to a bigger room (60sqm) with a nice balcony (6sqm) overlooking the pool and lawn area.
This Le Méridien Hotel has no lounge and there is no other compensation or Elite cocktails like in other properties in Asia.
As a welcome amenity we did choose the daily breakfast.
They prepared a fantastic welcome gift in our room together with a nice handwritten cards.
On the second night, after dinner, we found out at the Favola restaurant that Elite Members would get a 10% discount on regular F&B. No one had told us so far.
But all in all still a fantastic recognition as Ambassador Elite Member.
Eligible nights and points:
Nights, points and eligible spend was posted 2 days after our stay but incorrectly. I had the ambassador team correct the eliglible spend and so the points.
Concierge:
We didn't use the concierge service except for asking some small advice.
They were always there to help, they greeted us all the time and had a smile on their face and when we waited for the taxi they always came over and had a chat with us.
Also here the staff was fantastic.
Room / Suite:
The Bigger Kingsize Room with balcony we were upgraded to was absolutely beautiful.
It is a huge room per se with a massive bathroom, a walk in wardrobe, a huge bedroom and a big couch and desk.
The room has a great atmosphere and it was renovated / upgraded during covid.
The room is now very modern and beautiful. They use very dark colours, white and fantastic color accents such as beautiful Orchids, decoration or modern art.
Compared to our previous stay a few years ago the room looks much better now.
The room has huge french doors and floor to ceiling windows, which allow a lot of light to come in. The french doors lead to the very nice balcony overlooking the pool and lawn area.
The room itself is equipped with a king size bed. Unfortunately the mattress isn't the best anymore as it is worn out and has a pit in the middle.
Also the duvet isn't the newest anymore or it has been washed /cleaned incorrectly. All the feathers were in the same chambers of the pattern leaving the others without filling.
The pillows vice versa were simply top and comfortable.
The aircondition worked perfectly fine.
Bathroom:
The bathroom is very very big in size and quite modern as well.
It offeres a huge stand alone bathtub, a massive walk in Shower with a bench and rainforest shower head and a huge sink.
Housekeeping:
The room was cleaned properly and the bed was done astonishing perfect and impeccable. Housekeeping did a fantastic great job.
The hotel also offers an impeccable turndown service.
Housekeeping staff was super friendly and greeted every time you passed them on the hallway.
The room was super clean as were the public areas.
WiFi:
WiFi workes perfectly fine throught the entire hotel and the speed is also good. No issues to work or up/download any data.
F&B outlets/ Lounge:
Latest Recipe:
Latest recipe is the main restaurant of the Le Méridien Chiang Rai. It normally would offer breakfast, lunch and dinner.
We only had breakfast at this restaurant as it was still closed for lunch and dinner.
The breakfast buffet is very big and nice. It has different stations you can choose from. There is a bread and pastry station, fresh fruits and fresh squeezed juices, cereals, hot Asian
dishes, hot Western dishes as well as a live egg cooking station.
The quality of food was very good and everything was freshly prepared. Unfortunately on the first day the bread and croissants seemed to be old as they were really dry.
The staff at breakfast was phenomenal. They did an absolutely amazing job, were super friendly and interacted with the customers and showed real passion for what they did.
Favola:
This is the speciality restaurant of the Le Méridien Chiang Rai Hotel and it offers Italian cuisine. It is open for lunch and dinner.
We visited Favola already the last time we were here and we simply loved it back then. The food then was simply amazing. So we were looking forward to come back.
Also the Favola Restaurant was completely renovated and redone. It is now a very beautiful and modern restaurant and they have doubled the terrace size by the river.
The Designer should have checked before hand, as he has created a very beautiful Brasserie (French Style) instead of an Italian restaurant. But that is something different.
We were heavily disappointed about the quality of food. First all dishes were prepared without passion and class. The quality wasn't good. Some convenience food is better than the products we
got.
The kitchen staff here has a lot of work to do.
It used to be such an amazing and great restaurant and now it was so poor. Sad to see and experience.
Staff was super friendly, helpful and they went the extra mile for every customer.
Latitude 19:
Latitude 19 is sort of the lobby bar, coffee shop and bakery in one. It is open all day. During day it offers coffee and cakes and in the evening it becomes the hotel bar.
The bar is very modern and nice. The cakes were fantastic and also the drinks were really good. Staff was super friendly and helpful.
Pool Bar / Events by the River:
The Favola Restaurant serves also as the pool bar during day. They have a special drink and food menu for the pool.
On Tuesday, Friday and Saturday night, they organize special events by the river including live music.
It is great to see with which passion the property is doing different things to offer a lively experience.
Executive Lounge:
No lounge.
Pool / Spa / Gym:
The pool is beautiful at the Le Méridien Chiang Rai Resort & Spa. It has 3 levels on which the last one is an infinity pool to the lake on the property.
The gym is located on the 1st floor of the main building. It is very big in size and offers everything from cardio machines to weightlifting. It is open 24 hours.
The Parvati Spa has its own beautiful area next to the pool and it is nestled in the green with lots of trees.
We had two fantastic treatments at the spa and can definitely recommend it. It was a bliss.
Prices are very reasonable here at the spa. Yes, they are more expensive as outside the hotel, but again as already said, they do not charge 5-6 times the price like in Bangkok but around
double the price compared with a good spa outside. This is definitely reasonable as they offer the respective great service.
Social Media:
Social media is also very active here at this hotel.
They post, interact, communicate and re-post with their followers. Almost every hotel has a social media manager and it is great to see this interaction compared to the outsourced social
media in Europe.
Summary:
An really great stay at the Le Méridien Chiang Rai Resort & Spa.
The biggest asset of this property is their staff. Staff is simply amazing and they do run the hotel. They go above and beyond for the guests and show huge passion in what they do.
Management is invisible at this property or they must hide the entire day. Sometimes lead is missing and it would be nice if also management would show that they work in the same direction as
their staff.
The hotel is beautiful and has been renovated perfectly. It has become a little more modern but still with care and class. The rooms are amazing in size.
In our eyes the kitchen has the biggest homework to do to bring the level and quality back to pre covid levels.
We can definitely recommend to stay at this property and also we will come back should we be travelling to Chiang Rai again.
Notes:
- Paul the Sheep does not get any benefits from the Hotels/Airlines etc.
- Paul will always pay for the services in order to be able to rate freely and truly about the experiences.
-If you are interested in more details, please send us a private message and I will be happy to share more information and pictures.